Memories of Etched Glass
by Sionnain
Summary: Bellatrix Lestrange muses over a murder she committed long ago in the Dark Lord's name. Written for the Darkones' "Green Hair of Graves" challenge.


**Memories of Etched Glass**

_"There is a tear for all who die, A mourner o'er the humblest grave."_ - Lord Byron,  
Elegiac Stanzas--On the Death of Sir Peter Parker

I hate this room, because it reminds me of you. I only come here today because it is the anniversary of your death. Does that surprise you that I would remember? I am sure it does; wherever you are, you may smile at the irony if you so choose. It will not bother me.

I suppose if it were cleaned up, if the velvet drapes were dusted and the furniture polished, the floors swept and the paint touched up, it would be lovely. I remember your house used to have rooms like this, and I wonder if this is what it looks like now—chipped paint and scuffed floors, the room thick with dust and neglect. The light is sinister as it filters in, the late evening sun hitting the dirty windows and finding nowhere else to go. Only a few rays escape the trap and dance on the dust and the throw slivers of light on the floor, covered in the tattered remains of once-luxurious rugs.

The light manages only to tremble on the crumbling gold leaf of the ceiling, the hint of marble on the fireplace. Only one of the heavy maroon drapes is open, tucked into the curved brass of the drapery hook. I wonder if you were the last who left it open, because no one comes in here now.

My sister lives in rooms like this, but without the layers of filth and decay. I imagine there to be not one single speck of dust in her home, even now, when her husband is in Azkaban. We will get him out, of course we will, because the Dark Lord rewards his faithful.

_You_ were rewarded, but not for your faithfulness.

The late afternoon sun was spilling into the windows when I was called to attend him. I was fresh from my husband's bed, bloody scratch marks burning beneath my cloak. I had been summoned and my Mark had flared up, hot and sharp, and I had thrown the black garment over my naked, sweaty body and hurried to his side.

He was seated at the table in the dining room, and he was turned away from me, voice as cold as death when he spoke your sentence to me. He said it simply, without grandiose gestures or theatrical pronouncements. He has a reputation for the macabre, and I suppose it is well-earned.

Yet you merited only a coldly spoken order in the soft orange glow of the setting summer sun. I remember there were streaks of red in the sky, I remember he was drinking from a crystal goblet with an elaborate _R_ etched in the glass.

I did not think the gesture was deliberate, but one never knows with him. Would it make you happy, if he had done so on purpose? I think it might.

"He's in the parlor," the Dark Lord said, and turned towards me. "Make him suffer before you kill him. Make him scream."

I bowed and said nothing, and I found you exactly where he said you would be, standing and staring out of that window with one hand braced against the glass.

I stand now at the door as I did on that day, long ago, and I remember how you looked; dark hair falling in your face, eyes a little wild as you looked at me. Did you know why I was there, solemn, quiet? I think that you did, and that was why you looked so sad.

When we were children we used to run around your house and drive your brother mad. He always hated to be around me. He would tense up whenever Mother brought us over. He ignored my younger sister and he ran off with _her_, the one who bears the title of _sister_ no longer.

Maybe they whispered of secret things in corners of their own, but you and I would play in the parlor and you would tell me how when we were older, you would marry me.

"I'll serve you wine in fancy glasses," you would say, and you would smile at me and drag out the fancy goblets with the beautiful, curling _B_ etched in the glass.

At my wedding, your brother sent me nothing but his regrets and a card with a terse note of congratulations, but you toasted me and bought us a set of crystal glasses with an engraved _L_.

"I told you I'd serve you wine in crystal glasses," you teased me, pouring a delicious and spicy red merlot that you had selected, just for me, just for my wedding. Underneath your dress robes, I could feel the heat of the Mark as you poured. Mother had been furious because I'd nearly missed my engagement ball to be there when you'd taken it.

You had been prone, shivering on the floor as your Mark burned red and you vomited up your dinner, and I'd sat with you and held your hand. You kept telling me to leave and go to the party, and I told you "there are some things more important than family."

Until I brought you death and the sharp, stabbing pains of a thousand knives, I don't know that you ever believed me.

He wanted you to suffer, so I made you suffer. Your screams echoed off the wall and became a part of the room, as entwined within it as the peeling wallpaper and the tattered velvet drapes. As I stand here now I think I can see patterns in the dust where you fell, made from your limbs as you writhed under my Cruciatus.

This room reeks of death and mold, a thousand layers of cigar smoke and mildew seeping into the walls. There is a brown stain on the heavy white fabric that covers the chair in the corner, and I remember sitting there with my legs curled beneath me as I tortured you.  
Maybe the blood is yours, I seem to recall you grasping at the coverlet and pressing your face into it, red blood staining the cloth.

I remember the blood running out of your mouth, spilling on the floor. There is something sticky that traps the heel of my shoe, but I do not look down as I walk to the same chair, as I stare out of the dirty window and remember.

Sometimes I would stop, to let you catch your breath. Night had fallen and the only light was the bright red flare of my curse. It flashed off the walls and the glass, sharp and bright as it poured from my wand, as your screams poured from your mouth.

Remember how well I could see in the dark? When I would sleep over at your house, we would run from your room to mine and back again, seeing if the portraits would tattle and send us back to bed with their clamor.

It was always _you_ they saw, never me. I made it safe and sound to the other end of the hallway. You were always the one to get us in trouble, but no one ever believed you when you tried to stand up for me, the slight little girl with dark hair and wide, mistrustful eyes. You were always blamed for my mistakes.

"Don't play with her. She's a troublemaker." I heard your brother say this to you once, trying to pull you along with him out of the room where I had dropped the beautiful crystal goblet on the floor. The glass was shattered around me in sharp, jagged pieces. You pulled from his grasp and hurried back to me.

"I like her," you said, proud, little chin raised in defiance. "I'll help you clean it up," you promised, and you let me keep the piece with the _B_ on it, that was still strangely intact.

You cut yourself that day, and you lied and told your mother you'd broken the glass with your blood on your hands.

This room is a monument, your mausoleum. I think you are buried in the woods behind the house, but I cannot be sure. I run my hands over the marble, the wood of the table with the empty frames where photographs have been removed. My hands turn black from the dust.

_That_ day my hands were stained with your blood.

When you were lying there at last, broken and destroyed, I stood up over you. I stretched my muscles and took deep, calming breaths. Torturing you had exhausted me—I had to find the hate within me, when all my memories of you were anything but. All I could remember was you with the glass in your hand, bleeding, telling your mother you had done it and sparing me the punishment for my willful destruction.

It was the only time I cried when I tortured anyone, and I was glad your eyes were gone—blood vessels long since burst—so that you could not see them on my face. I was ashamed of them, they were a weakness.

Your voice startled me, I did not think you still had a tongue. Usually my victims had bitten them off long before I was finished. You spit blood out as you spoke but I understood what you said. "I wanted to go home, Bella." Your voice was a soft, sad whisper.

The room sounded like it sighed as you spoke, or maybe it was me. I went down on my knees next to you, and pointed the wand with a shaking hand. I held your hand with my free one, felt where you had pierced the skin with your nails and bled. Your blood soaked into me, and I welcomed it.

"You are, Regulus," I whispered, and then I killed you. I did it fast and quick, before you could even draw in a breath to sob. I owed you that, at least.

_"It wasn't Bellatrix, mama. I did it. I broke the glass. See?" Hands held up, blood on your palms. _

I remained until the moon rose in the sky, swollen and full. In the spill of moonlight you looked peaceful, asleep, but I could see the tears mixed with blood on your face.

_There are some things more important than family, Regulus. _

I stand there now, years later, in the room where you died, where I killed you on his orders, and I wonder if you are with your brother now. Will you both embrace, and will he chide you, as he did so long ago?

_"I told you not to play with her."_

"Give him my regards, Regulus," I say. After all, I have sent him to you. It was a gift, take it and let this be over between us. No more will be a curse on the House of Black, because I have killed you all. The name will fade into oblivion. Let it be ended, then.

I turn my back and leave, closing the door firmly behind me. I close it with a spell so that it cannot be opened until next year, when I will return to pace this room and soak in the memories that it holds.

I killed you, but I mourn you still, though the Dark Lord will never know. What is one more black mark on my soul? I smile grimly at the pun as I ascend the stairs; my smile is a twisted and horrible remnant of what it once was.

_I_ am a twisted and horrible remnant of what I once was. Your death is testament to that.

Rodolphus waits for me in the room upstairs and will hold me while I tremble in his arms. This night I will dream of you, as I do every year, and you will be holding a glass with a _B_ etched into the surface, sipping wine the color of blood, and your eyes will be empty holes of darkness, like my soul.

Finis


End file.
